Published at 7:49 PM PST on Jan 9, 2018

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The San Mateo County District Attorney's Office has announced plans to seek the death penalty for a Redwood City man accused of sexually assaulting his girlfriend's infant daughter before beating her to death in Aug. 2015.

Daniel Contreras, 29, had been dating the infant's mother for roughly two months when she left 17-month-old Evelyn alone with him for the first time on Aug. 6, 2015.

Contreras claimed the infant had been injured falling off a changing table, but an autopsy determined that was not the case. He was arrested two days later.

Contreras has been charged with murder occurring during the commission of forcible lewd acts on a child, assaulting the child resulting in her death and three separate counts of forcible lewd acts on a child.

Defense attorney James Thompson said Tuesday he's astonished that the District Attorney's Office thought this was an appropriate case in which to seek the death penalty.

In order to secure a conviction for first-degree murder, prosecutors typically have to prove intent to kill on the part of the defendant, but Evelyn's death was unintentional according to Thompson, who added that suspects intending to kill their victim often use techniques likely to cause death such as shooting, stabbing or choking them.

"There's a lot of ways to kill someone if you intend to kill them," Thompson said. "This is not one of those cases."

Thompson also disputed the prosecution's description of the interaction between Contreras and Evelyn as a "beating," saying that might be the wrong word.